


At the Still Point of the Turning World

by Amelia_Clark



Series: 30 Day Cheesy Trope Challenge [19]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bittersweet, Feels, First Kiss, Heaven, M/M, Memories, nobody's dead though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-02
Updated: 2014-12-02
Packaged: 2018-02-27 21:52:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2708042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amelia_Clark/pseuds/Amelia_Clark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A trip to Heaven to confront Metatron takes Dean and Cas elsewhere.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At the Still Point of the Turning World

**Author's Note:**

> **#16: Seven minutes in Heaven**  
>  Because some of us didn't get invited to those kinds of parties.

Dean lands hard in a field, stars above him shocking in their clarity. "Cas?" he calls as he gets to his feet.

"I'm here," says Cas, and yeah, he's right next to him, where else would he be. "This isn't right," he says, narrowing his eyes at the sky as a shower of sparks appears in the distance.

"No, I recognize this," Dean says. "This is...1996? Fourth of July. I've been here before, when I was—wait, am I dead again? Did you kill me on accident?"

Cas frowns at him, offended. "No, Dean, I brought you through the portal alive. But we should be in the dungeon, outside Metatron's cell, not—oh, wait." He stops and cocks his head to the side. "Of course."

"Uh, share with the rest of the class?" says Dean. He's turned away from the memory, but he can still hear it: the whoosh and pop of the fireworks, Sammy's whoops of delight as they go off. His own young laughter. He doesn't want to be here.

"I'm an angel—mostly—so I have access to the...let's call it the 'infrastructure' of Heaven? Much of it, anyway. But as a human, you're confined to your own past experiences. Your own Heaven."

"Yeah, I was here before, with Sam. But we were dead. How does this exist if I'm still alive?"

"Your Heaven's not created whole cloth when you die, Dean. It's assembled from your memories as they happen—always there, but access is limited." Cas sets off across the grass, away from Dean's teenage joy. "Come on," he says over his shoulder. "I think I can navigate."

Dean catches up with him, and they walk in silence as the scene changes around them. There's daylight now, but it's muted, gray, the trees grown heavy and foreboding. "Wait," says Dean as they step into a clearing. "Wait, this is—“

It's Purgatory. Another Cas crouches by a stream, bearded and dirty, and he looks up at their approach. "Dean," he says, defeat in his voice, and Dean can't help but walk forward, throw his arms around him. 

"Damn, it's good to see you," he says, feeling the rush of the moment all over again. Even knowing what comes after—Cas's staying behind in an attempt at martyrdom, the long months of grief where Dean thought he'd failed him, again—even with that, it's so good to find him. It's so good to hold him.

Dean steps away, glances back at the Cas of the present, who's staring at Dean and his past self with a puzzled look. "Why are we here?" he asks. "How is this a good memory?"

"Maybe it wasn't for you, since you were on that self-sacrifice trip. But I'd been looking for you for months, Cas. Benny knew the way out, I coulda been back, I just didn't care. I didn't wanna leave without you."

He's said this before, in patches. Facing it here, though? Cas knowing that, yeah, this was one of the best moments of Dean's life, it feels bigger. It feels like a lump in Dean's throat that he can't swallow. "Keep goin'," he says. "Lead the way, I need to face down the fucker who killed me."

"Across the stream," says Cas, and sets off again. Dean follows, leaving scruffy past-Cas behind, to wash his face and be found, over and over.

They're in an alley, and Dean knows it immediately: out back of the brothel in Maine, fleeing that angry hooker the night he'd tried to get Cas laid. There he is, laughing and laughing, throwing his arm around a mystified Cas. Cas was so awkward then, still with that angelic stick up his ass. That mix of badass and clueless nerd—goddamit, it was adorable. Dean can almost admit it to himself in retrospect.

And he hasn't laughed like that since.

He sneaks a look at Cas (Cas now, so much more comfortable with free will, humanity—hell, even sex). Cas is smiling. "I remember this," he says softly. "I had no idea what was so funny, but I liked seeing you happy. It made me happy, and I wasn't used to the feeling."

"Yeah, you ruined that poor girl's night, buddy." Dean risks a companionable arm around Cas's neck, squeezes his shoulder. Cas doesn't step away, and Dean's pretty sure he even leans in a little.

They walk together, Cas's hand brushing Dean's hip ever so slightly as it swings, and walk out onto a dock, the lake before them sparkling in the sun. There's a folding chair, a fishing pole.

"Huh," says Dean. "This was a dream."

"Yes. I came to you." Cas walks to the end of the dock, gazing out over the water.

"Why is this here?" says Dean, but he crosses to the chair and sits. "This didn't really happen."

"In some senses, it didn't. In others, it did. And apparently you remember it fondly."

"I do," says Dean, casts out his line. There are birds singing; the temperature is perfect. "I wanted to stay here, it's so peaceful."

"Do you dream of this place often?"

"Now and then. When I'm sleeping well enough, I guess."

"So that's why you're here, then. It's a place of peace within you."

"Yeah." There's a tug on the line, but Dean ignores it. "But I don't think this is the dream in general, Cas. I don't think—this is that time, specifically. That time you were here."

Cas looks down at him, tilts his head. "The time I came to you," he says. "The time we were here together."

"Yeah," says Dean.

They should move on. There's a dick archangel to interrogate, the possibility of Cas's grace still out there. But Dean can't make himself stand up. He can't stop looking at Cas, here and real in the calmest part of Dean's mind, or soul, or whatever.

"Time moves differently here," says Cas suddenly.

"Uh, okay. Good to know, I guess."

"No, I mean—Dean, we don't have to hurry." Cas crouches beside him, takes the fishing pole and reels it in. "We can stay here for a little while, if you want. We have time."

"Oh," says Dean. He fidgets in his chair.

"We have time to do this," says Cas, and leans forward to press his mouth to Dean's.

Dean gasps, startled for a second, and then he kisses him back, takes Cas's face in his hands and nudges his mouth open with his tongue. Cas is clutching at Dean's jacket, the hair on the nape of his neck.

And maybe it's just Dean's imagination, but he thinks he can feel Heaven shift, the moment change. He thinks that this memory—this long-ago dream—is fading, being replaced. 

That this, this right now, is becoming something he gets to come back to.

**Author's Note:**

> Title's a line from T.S. Eliot's "Four Quartets." The only line I remember.


End file.
